


It's Only Forever, Not Long At All

by I_have_a_Mycroft_of_my_very_own



Series: Barduil [2]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Ace!Thranduil, Forever!Bard Au, Soulmate AU, what am I even doing? I do not knooooowwwww!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-06
Updated: 2015-06-06
Packaged: 2018-04-03 02:53:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,811
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4083880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_have_a_Mycroft_of_my_very_own/pseuds/I_have_a_Mycroft_of_my_very_own
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Destined not to ever age a single day more, Bard grows to resent looking into the mirror and seeing the exact same face staring back at him as he’d had that day. Bard begins to feel like the world has sped up around him, leaving him behind again, like it had in those nine years in which he had yet to meet his sweetheart, and thought he would remain eighteen forever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Only Forever, Not Long At All

**Author's Note:**

> Based very loosely on this au http://thranduilland.tumblr.com/post/120755292543/dilhowltersboyfriend-milkystreet
> 
> I am going to turn this into a series. But I'm still kind of fleshing this idea out. So it might be a bit... clunky? So sorry for that in advance. 
> 
> In all my Barduil stories, Thranduil is going to be Ace. Because in canon, elves can only marry once, and since marriage is done through sex for them, Thranduil is forbidden from having sex with anyone. But that just makes him celibate. The ace part is because canonically for elves, after they have been married for a few hundred years/after they have had children their sex drive dies, and while they look back on the sexual part of their lives with happiness, they no longer have a desire to engage in sexual activity unless they want more children. (Also, I'm Aro Ace and Asexual Thranduil makes me all kinds of happy).

There are stories, passed down through the ages. Stories of men and women who stop aging once they reach maturity, doomed never to grow old except by their soulmate’s side. It does not happen to everyone, but every bloodline has one. People like this are called Forevers, because most never find their soulmates, and so continue to go on, only falling by battle, sickness, or suicide. For some Forevers, they have multiple soulmates. When, or if, one soulmate dies, the Forever will sometimes stumble across someone who makes them start aging again. The soulmate of a Forever doesn’t always have to be another Forever, even though most of the time they are. Children of two Forevers tend to be Forevers themselves. No one truly understands how it works, only that it has always been this way.

Bard the Bargeman is a Forever, his wife is one, too, but sickness claims her at forty nine years of age, and Bard stops growing the day she dies. Destined not to ever age a single day more, Bard grows to resent looking into the mirror and seeing the exact same face staring back at him as he’d had that day. Bard begins to feel like the world has sped up around him, leaving him behind again, like it had in those nine years in which he had yet to meet his sweetheart, and thought he would remain eighteen forever. His children grow older every day, and he prays they will not be like him, but their parents are Forevers, as their grandparents were, they will be Forevers, too, when maturity comes.

There are no stories of elves and Forevers falling in love. No stories of elves being soulmates with Forevers, so it confuses Bard a great deal when one day, shortly after the Battle of Five Armies, he finds new wrinkles around his eyes that have never been there before. Wrinkles that should not be there now.

The Lake Towners are already dismissed, as Bard has not aged once in the years since his wife died, and he’s met everyone in Lake Town. There have been no other humans yet making their way to Dale, with winter so near, and that leaves only someone among the dwarves or the elves as the likely culprit. Bard sighs at his luck, dwarves and elves both live longer than normal humans, he has no idea how this will affect him.

* * *

It takes him approximately four months and seven days to discover his soulmate is an elf, in fact, it takes him approximately four months and eight days to discover who his soulmate is, except he refuses to acknowledge it. 

* * *

For some reason, a Forever does not start aging when they find their soulmate until they speak with their soulmate, whether this is simply apologizing for bumping into them, or a full conversation. It is for this reason that Bard safely ticks off most of the dwarves of Erebor, and most of the Mirkwood elves. Bilbo is ticked off almost immediately because once the Hobbit leaves, Bard continues to age, as he would not do if the Hobbit was his mate. He is not particularly pleased with the left over possibilities, but he’ll manage.

The dwarves are ticked off completely when Dain mentions in passing that he’s always wanted to meet a Forever, and then proceeds to talk about Forevers who fall in love with dwarves aging as if they had never been Forevers at all. Bard is more grateful to Dain than perhaps he should be, but he does not mind.

The next morning, Bard meets with Thranduil, and then takes a walk along the water’s edge, where he discovers, upon looking at his reflection in the water, that a few strands of his hair have turned white.

“Impossible.” He whispers, sitting down at the water’s edge and staring intently at his reflection, running his hands through the white strands. “It’s impossible.” Bard stays there for hours, until Bain finds him as it nears dark.

“Da?” Bain asks, coming to sit beside his father, his eyes widen in surprise when he sees the white hairs and he smiles. “Da, who?” he asks, before he sees how upset Bard is by this. “Da?”

“Nothing. No one. I don’t know.” Bard replies, shaking his head. “It doesn’t matter, Bain. Come, we should head home.” Bard says, standing quickly and turning back towards the city. Bain frowns at him but follows along quietly.

* * *

It is two years, six months, and five days after the Battle of Five Armies when Bard finally comes clean. He’s lead into it, and never been as unsure about anything in his life, but it is no longer something he can ignore anymore. With streaks of white continuing to appear in his hair, no matter what he does to get rid of them, they aren’t growing any more frequent, simply growing to replace the ones Bard pulls out. The wrinkles around his eyes continue to grow more noticeable, even though they, too, have not yet multiplied. The most noticeable sign of Bard’s aging is his right knee, which he injured as a very young child and it never really healed completely. It has started to ache in bad weather, and it clicks sometimes when he climbs stairs. He has yet to begin limping, but sometimes he comes close.

And with every day that passes, he can feel himself falling more and more in love. His awe and gratitude evolving into affection and adoration.

* * *

“Forgive me for prying, Lord Bard, but I am curious.” Thranduil says one evening when they are in his study in Mirkwood, drinking wine and relaxing after a day of renegotiating all manner of trade agreements. “I was under the impression you were a Forever?” he asks, looking at the Bargeman turned King. Bard sighs heavily and looks into his drink.

“I am.” He answers with a small frown.

“Then you have found your soulmate?” Thranduil pries, and Bard would like very much to ask him to stop, but he doesn’t, he simply nods instead. “Will I ever have the honour of meeting them?” Thranduil asks, Bard has known Thranduil long enough now to pick up the undertone of hurt carried in the words. Thranduil is his friend, and unsettled by the confirmation that Bard has yet to introduce his friend to his soul mate. Bard rubs at his temple and bites his lip turning away.

“I’m sure you already know them.” He replies, “In fact, I’m certain you know them much better than I.” Thranduil’s eyebrow raises at this and he places his goblet down on his desk and cocks his head to the side.

“Explain?” he asks, keeping from making it an order, an expectation, like he normally would.

“Two years and six months ago, I started aging again for the first time since my wife died. I knew instantly it was not a human. It was not the Hobbit, either, as he left, and still I aged. Four months and seven days from that day, I discovered it was not a dwarf either, or I would have aged as if I was not Forever. That only left your elves.” Bard pauses, swirls his wine around before speaking again. “The next morning, I met with you. We discussed boring things, what exactly I do not recall. And I left to walk along the water’s edge. When I looked into the water, I had white in my hair that had not been there that morning. Many things made sense then, and many more stopped.” Bard says, turning to look at his friend, who is watching him with an expression somewhere between confusion, surprise, and something that looks an awful lot like hope. “Men aren’t meant to live forever. Even Forevers are destined to die. They are doomed to never age except by their soulmate’s side. We’re supposed to age together. But elves do not age.”

“Bard?” Thranduil asks, still not yet having fitted the pieces together. Bard can see he is trying to.

“More time. It’s the compromise given to us. A slower aging, but an aging all the same. A wrinkle here. A strand of white hair there. An ache that starts in an old injury. The more time I spend near my soulmate, the slower I age. But when I avoid them, it’s like my body is playing catch up the next time I see them. The aching in my knee began when I saw my soulmate for the first time after six months of avoiding them.  The compromise is time. I have been given more time to be with my immortal soulmate, but I have not been given forever. Because even Forevers are destined to die.” Bard sighs and shakes his head, looking back down into his wine. “I thought ‘if I stay away, he’ll never have to know’, but it is not possible. When you are king and your soulmate is king of a neighbouring kingdom and one of your greatest allies, you can’t avoid them forever. So, yes, Thranduil, I’m certain you know yourself much better than I.” they fall into silence, and Bard does not have the courage to look up, to see what emotions flicker across Thranduil’s face or flash in his eyes.

“Bard?” Thranduil asks quietly, breaking the silence. Bard does not look up, but he hears the small sigh Thranduil gives. “Bard, I would happily share my forever with you.” Bard looks to him quickly, feeling light headed from the speed at which he does so.

“But you’ve never given any indication that you cared about me, as more than a friend, I mean.” Bard exclaims, incredulous.

“I care for you a great deal, Bard, but I will never be able to offer you anything greater than romance and affection. I am forbidden from laying with anyone but my wife, whether I am to ever see her again or not. I did not pursue you, because I thought you’d found your soulmate, and I was unaware that it was me.” Thranduil replies, a little smile playing on his lips.

“Oh. Well, I think we both feel really idiotic right about now.” Bard admits with a little laugh.

“Yes.” Thranduil replies, chuckling. “So used to having forever, we squandered time we did not have on trying to spare the other’s feelings.”

“So, if we’ve finally communicated our feelings to each other. Do I get a kiss?” Bard asks, leaning forward over the desk. Thranduil smiles and rolls his eyes. “I _did_ slay a dragon this one time, you may remember, and it’s how we eventually met?” Thranduil snorts, shakes his head and leans forward to give Bard a very chaste kiss on the lips.

“My hero.” He teases, laughing as Bard draws him into a deep and desperate kiss.

And so begins their forever.


End file.
